Will smiles, and it is as bright as day.
“Are we going to use the Tempests?” I whisper, taking his hand and stepping onto the branch. I have to press up against him so that he can pull my window all but closed again.
“Not yet,” he says, and my disappointment must show, because he adds, “I promise you can try them soon.”
We shimmy down the tree, and I’m glad I spent so much time scaling the oak that towered over Mother’s garden in my backyard. “You really can climb,” he says when I jump from the bottom branch.
“Impressed?” I ask, but hope he’s not so impressed that he won’t try to take my hand again.
We stick to the shadows, and Will finds the shortest part of the garden wall for us to hop over. We head in the direction of town and school. The night air is chilled enough to pull my breath out in white puffs, but the Embers are working nicely. I have a sense of warmth that glows, as cozy as if I were wrapped in a blanket at the foot of a fire.
We move quickly on foot. “Where are we going?” I eventually ask.
“This way,” Will says, and we take the fork that heads away from town. “There’s a clearing just a bit beyond school.”
“And we’re going there in the middle of the night?”
“Just us, and a few dozen of our closest friends.” He squints. “And rivals.”
“Do you often meet up with large groups of people in the dead of night?”
“I do when it means getting to race with the Tempests.”
“The Tempests that have been outlawed, you mean?”
He cocks an eyebrow at me. “Not outlawed. Strongly discouraged.”
“Hence why we’re sneaking out without telling your parents . . .”
“Yes,” he says, “although I think they know more than they let on. So far they haven’t said anything. But if I come to breakfast with a broken limb, I’ll be in it for sure.”
We pass the school, which is huge and dark and looming in the night, and cut through the adjacent orchard. Apples hang heavy on the branches like oversize ornaments. “Midnight snack?” Will plucks a few as we pass and tosses me one.
“It’s our tradition,” I tease, and bite into it. It is sweet and crisp, and with my night vision its white flesh practically glows.
Someone drops down from the shadows to greet Will, and I stop myself from shrieking just in time. “Carter,” Will says, slapping him on the back. “Thanks for keeping watch tonight.”
Carter nods and pulls himself back up into the branches of a tree. “Just do me a favor and win. Larkin’s already been running his mug.”
“Sounds about right,” Will says. We keep moving through the trees, and others are coming behind us. Everyone is dressed in black. “Almost there,” Will says. Beyond the orchard the trees give way to a clearing, and then we come upon a still, dark lake.
I can make out some of our classmates—?the hulking shadow of Chase Peterson, the girl from dressmaking who always walks on her tiptoes—?gathered on the strip of pale beach that rings the lake. My heart rises at the hushed sound of Beas’s laugh, but I can’t tell exactly where it’s coming from. We walk toward the students, who are clumped in patches between two long docks that bookend either side of the beach.
Eliza is at the head of the nearest group, shaking her hair, smiling with her white teeth. My stomach twists as Will leads us over to her. Please, no, I think.
“Hey, ’Liza,” Will says as we join her. “You and Aila know each other, right?” he asks, but his eyes are already on a row of others lining up along the beach.
Eliza shrugs. I don’t say anything at all.
“I’ll find you after,” Will says, leaning toward me. “Do you know what a kazoo sounds like?”
“Yes,” I say, amused despite the fact that he is about to abandon me with Eliza Patton.
“That’s the warning sign. If you hear it, run and hide. Pick a tree or something—?now that I’ve seen you climb.” And with a smile, he leaves to find his friends, who are warming up on the beach.
I stand awkwardly beside Eliza, playing first with my hair and then with my hands, searching the crowd for anyone familiar. I finally glimpse Beas, and she waves, looking surprised to see me. I try not to feel hurt that we spent all of biology together this morning and she never mentioned anything about this.
“A!” she says, walking over to me. “You came!” She grins. “You’re a bit more of a rebel than I’d pegged you for.”
I smile back and decide that whether Sterling is temporary or not, I actually want to be real friends with Beas. There’s something about her that reminds me of my mother. Perhaps it’s the way she refuses to march to everyone else’s beat.
Or maybe she’s just hearing a different one altogether.
“Hey, ’Liz,” Beas adds, pronouncing it like lies. She links arms with us both. Eliza rolls her eyes.
“Guess what? Thom’s coming tonight,” Beas whispers. “I know the race is very hush-hush. But . . .” Her giggle is throaty. “I invited him anyway.”
Eliza releases Beas’s arm and sits. “You’re playing with fire,” she says, examining her nails.
Beas drops down next to her on a slab of driftwood. “Anybody got any Embers?” she asks, ignoring Eliza. Tonight John Greenleaf Whittier peeks out from the hem of her skirt:
Are these poor fragments only left
Of vain desires and hopes that failed?
By the time George slips through the trees, there are around forty of us on the Sterling side and almost as many gathered for the opposing team. The sky is an abyss without the stars, and my night vision makes the lake look like a dark silver mirror that reflects nothing at all.
“Aila?” George asks in surprise when he spots me. He dips his head to make sure. “Are you running tonight?”
I pat the rough hunk of log next to me. “I hadn’t planned on it.”
“You should,” he said. “I’m not. But everyone should have this experience at least once in their lives.” George sets his bag at his feet and plops down, his freckles glowing like constellations.
“And what experience is that?” I ask, but I’m startled by Beas suddenly leaping to her feet. She throws herself on an approaching figure, laughing her throaty laugh, muffled by the kisses she is planting all over his face and neck.
She leads a tall boy with dark eyes toward us, her face flushed and her eyes shining.
George reaches out a hand to shake, and Eliza offers a wan smile. “Oh, hi, Thom,” she says casually before returning to her nails.
“A, this is Thom,” Beas says. “Thom, this is that girl I was telling you about.” She wrinkles her nose at me. “Good things,” she assures me.
“Any friend of Beas—” he says, grinning.
I dip my head at him. “Nice to meet you.” He is tall and broad, and Beas just fits into him, her dark head barely grazing his chin.
“Here, have some Embers,” she says, and reaches on her tiptoes to sprinkle a handful over him.
“I have to leave by two to get home.” He sits where the sand meets the grass.